Lightened Up – Chocolate S’mores Cupcakes

It goes without saying that Jessica at How Sweet It Is is the queen of all things dessert. And margaritas. And fish sandwiches.

But anyway, since she posted her recipe for S’mores Brownies, I’ve been wanting to make them. Considering the fact that I’m getting married in less than two months (!), I tried to make them a bit lighter when I made them for a fourth of July gathering this past weekend.

Instead of graham crackers for the base, I used ginger thin cookies. I’ve seen them at drugstores and grocery stores in the foreign foods areas, but this weekend I saw this large box at Big Lots for only $2!

Anyway, to “lighten up” the graham cracker ginger thin crust, crushed the cookies with an egg white in my Magic Bullet, until they formed a thick paste (please excuse the super old, discolored muffin tin). I also made a batch of mini cupcakes with just the crumbled cookies (no egg white) and they stayed together pretty well too.

To smush down the cookie paste and make it even in the bottom of the cupcake liners, I coated a small juice glass with cooking spray, which worked nicely.

If you use the egg white mixture you should bake the base layer for about 6-8 minutes. When I used the crumbs alone I didn’t pre-bake them.

I cheated with a boxed cake mix and an old weight watchers trick – 1 can of diet soda. Don’t ask me how this works (all of my college chemistry courses can’t help me explain it), but it does. 1 box + 1 can = immediate calorie reduction. No eggs, no oil, nothing else needed.

You still have to stir the batter a good bit to get it to look like normal batter – trust me, it will get there! The best part of the diet soda trick? You can eat the batter raw and not worry one bit! I’m not admitting to anything though! ;)

Pour the batter over the cookie bases, about 3/4 full. These are the minis that had just the crumbs as a base:

Baking these was tricky – you just have to do the toothpick test (unless the cake mix gives you an estimated time for cupcakes). Once they were done, I topped them with a single large marshmallow (or 1/4 of a large one for the minis).

After going under the broiler for about 3 minutes, they were a gorgeous golden brown – and the kitchen smelled SO GOOD. They came out slightly puffy, but my darling fiance’ had the great idea of pushing the marshmallows down – very carefully – which spread the melted sugar all over the top of the cupcake, just like icing.

One box of cake mix made 12 large cupcakes and 24 minis. And I may have consumed A SMALL AMOUNT of leftover batter. :)

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19 responses to “Lightened Up – Chocolate S’mores Cupcakes”

These look amazing, even got that campfire toasted look. i’m kind of middle of the line with smores. in camping/summer environments i always want one, but once i do i’m over it and don’t like it as much as i was craving it!
It’s so exciting that your wedding is coming up so fast! How is your foot? Is it getting better? Also, one of my Polish friends started a blog about planning a Polish wedding, I thought you might be interested :)http://mybigfatpolishwedding.blogspot.com

oh my! there is ALL sorts of goodness going on here! i LOVE s’mores!! and these look divine claire! i love the diet soda + cake mix trick ~ my co-worker used to bake 7-up cakes, i just love that name ~ 7-up cake ;)
xx ~ kristina

Coolest baking tip ever. And those marshmallows look friggen awesome once they’ve baked. I honestly didn’t think they would melt down like that, but it works out so well. And ya, who doesn’t love smores. I’m actually kind of sad when I go to a bonfire and there’s no smores…I kinda think people are crazy who don’t do that!